News

Each resident and staffer at all Texas nursing homes will be tested for the novel coronavirus, a spokesman for Gov. Greg Abbott told The Texas Tribune this week.

With the dual threats of the coronavirus outbreak and the spring storm season, Canadian ISD Superintendent Lynn Pulliam announced changes to the district’s storm-shelter procedures and policies.

The Texas Education Agency on May 5 announced graduation guidance for the class of 2020. Under the guidelines, ceremonies may take place as early as May 15 as the state continues the reopening of services in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Spring branding is one of the most picturesque rituals in agriculture. Months-old calves and their mamas are rounded up pasture by pasture. The calves are separated, roped by their back legs, and dragged to waiting cowboys and cowgirls who work as a coordinated team to vaccinate, ear-tag, castrate the bulls, and brand the young bovines with an identifying registered mark of their owner’s ranch.

A Monday night fire at the Jeremy Oatman home at 608 S. 6th Street destroyed an old chicken coop, and damaged a nearby pole barn and the framework of a greenhouse. At 10 pm, dispatchers alerted the Canadian VFD, who then rolled out five trucks, including both city pumpers and three grass rigs, to the scene. Firefighters battled the flames for about two hours. Fire Chief Scott Brewster said the cause of the fire was undetermined.

This B-1 Lancer was transported to Kansas Thursday morning, on its way to be decommissioned and scanned for part fabrication. It traveled through Canadian en route north on US 83, with a full escort of law enforcement and other security vehicles, stopping all traffic on its way. These are just a couple of the impromptu photos that we are certain documented its final mission. CHERI SMITH

A clear majority of voters in both Higgins and Canadian ISDs voted in favor of consolidation, finally settling the hotlydebated decision by both school district’s trustees to support joining forces.

Weekly jobless claims hit 3.84 million last week nationwide, higher than economist expectations of 3.5 million. The total brings the rolling six-week figure to 30.3 million. Rural counties accounted for the loss of a quarter of a million jobs in March alone, according to this report in the Daily Yonder. In the first jobs report after the pandemic forced widespread shutdowns, rural employment dropped 1.2 percent from February to March. Metropolitan counties fared worse, with a drop of 1.9 percent of total employment. Hemphill County reported a loss of 30 jobs during that month—better than the national average, but our overall unemployment rate rose to 3.9 percent in March. Job loss numbers here can be expected to rise again when the figures are released for April.